Still no easy legal way to go

In her recent Quarterly Essay “Voting for Jesus”, Amanda Lohrey identifies a fundamentalist, all-denomination Christian lobby that half a century ago would have been unimaginable.

While she notes that they are small in actual number, where VE is concerned it is these activist politicians who are succeeding, not only in keeping displays out of Parliament House, but in bedevilling the political process wherever you look.

The reaction of conservative groups like the Christian Democratic Party in WA to Attorney General Jim McGinty’s proposal to introduce Living Will legislation into that state - a move which would bring that state into line with most others - is one case in point.

Family First’s response this week to MP Bob Such’s plan to introduce his “Right to Choose” Private Member's Bill to the SA Parliament is another that must be noted if the uneasy dance between church and state is to be understood.

Recently, a third patient of mine travelled half way around the world to Switzerland to receive lawful help to die. Another two holidayed in Mexico in order to buy the lethal drugs that would provide them with a peaceful death.

A decade ago, the intensely conservative Christian politician Kevin Andrews bragged that he had set the VE issue back at least ten years. At a legislative level that might be so, but what he didn’t bargain for was Australians’ resourcefulness and dogged belief in a fair go. His Bill may have bolted the legislative door, but that has simply prized open other doors, ones that lead down other darker and more dangerous paths.